About 10,000 years ago, a weedy grass growing in Mexico possessed a strange trait known as a “jumping gene” and transformed itself into a larger and more useful grass, the cereal grass that we would come to know as maize and then corn.

The Smoky Hill Museum this Thursday will host Cynthia Clampitt for a Zoom-only presentation as she shares how this grain would transform the Americas, from rescuing a few early settlers, to creating the Midwest, to building the world we know.

According to the museum, today corn is more important than ever. “Without corn, North America – and most particularly modern, technological North America – is inconceivable,” writes Margaret Visser in her classic work Much Depends on Dinner. Cynthia Clampitt is a writer, speaker, food historian, and author of Midwest Maize: How Corn Shaped the U.S. Heartland.

As Cynthia Clampitt lives in Illinois, this free presentation is offered via Zoom only, Thursday, February 5, 5:30-6:30 pm. Register for your Zoom link at www.smokyhillmuseum.org.